Final Cut Pro X Cookbook potx

Importing music from iTunes and GarageBand 14Importing data from a tape-based camera 19Importing and working with layered Photoshop files 21 Importing Final Cut Pro 7 projects 26Working

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Final Cut Pro X

Cookbook

Edit with style and ease using the latest editing technologies in Final Cut Pro X!

Jason Cox

Final Cut Pro X Cookbook

Copyright © 2012 Packt Publishing

All rights reserved No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system,

or transmitted in any form or by any means, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embedded in critical articles or reviews.Every effort has been made in the preparation of this book to ensure the accuracy of the information presented However, the information contained in this book is sold without warranty, either express or implied Neither the author, nor Packt Publishing, and its dealers and distributors will be held liable for any damages caused or alleged to be caused directly

or indirectly by this book

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companies and products mentioned in this book by the appropriate use of capitals However, Packt Publishing cannot guarantee the accuracy of this information

First published: October 2012

Proofreaders Aaron Nash Maria Gould

Indexer Monica Ajmera

Production Coordinator Prachali Bhiwandkar Cover Work

Prachali Bhiwandkar

About the Author

Jason Cox has enjoyed capturing images since receiving his first Mickey-Matic film

camera when he was four years old Growing up in the Washington, D.C area, he spent much of his youth wandering around with some form of a camera, still or video, in hand Jason graduated from Penn State with degrees in film production and English After spending

a couple of years as an entertainment journalist for a newspaper, Jason returned to D.C

to strike out on his own, eventually starting up his own L.L.C., Some Might Say Media He

currently juggles a mixed workload of freelance video production and editing, as well as teaching courses as a certified trainer for both Apple and Adobe software

Outside of his working life, Jason enjoys traveling (he met his Scottish wife in

New Zealand—long story!), playing old school Nintendo games, going to music

and cultural events, and drinking chocolate milk

Thanks to Luisa, Sean, Anthony, Katie, and the other certified trainers who

have given me the support and inspiration to propel myself forward in the

last couple of years

And, of course, a huge thanks to my beautiful, amazing wife, Vikki, who

spent months putting up with my constant reassurances of "I promise I'll

have more time when the book is done!"

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About the Reviewers

Tyler Knowles is a certified Final Cut Pro editor as well as an Apple certified trainer

and technician Tyler has over a dozen years of experience in digital video production and post-production In six years as a professional living in Los Angeles, Tyler's editing work has been lent to five feature films, a children's television series, National commercial

spots, music videos, student shorts, and numerous productions around California Tyler

is also noted as a Cinematographer, Sound Designer, Producer, and Director Recently, Tyler directed an 87-minute mockumentary road trip movie about two guys hauling a

horse trailer full of beer across the United States entitled Go West Happy Cow

I'd like to thank my parents, Jack and Ellyn, for encouraging me to follow my

dream of making movies

David J Smolar is an Apple-certified Final Cut Pro Editor and award-winning Producer with over 20 years' experience in digital media production, broadcasting, and production management He has a B.A from the University of Maryland and an M.A in Digital Visual Media from American University As a graduate student, David designed, opened, and

managed American University's School of Communications' first Digital Video Editing Lab He mastered his instructing skills by teaching nearly 50 undergraduate and graduate students Final Cut Pro David's M.A thesis documentary was the first in the school's history to be shot, edited, and output entirely in the digital realm

David's early career began as an Engineer, Producer, and Assistant Editor for all-news WTOP while writing and reporting traffic and weather for Shadow Broadcasting He spent over four years with Discovery Communications where, among other things, he supported executive

producers on over 100 hours of programming, including the very popular series I Shouldn't Be

Alive, A Haunting, and the history-making series of programs on the first tomb discovered in

Egypt's Valley of the Kings since King Tut was unearthed He supported, reviewed, and vetted programs for the Discovery, Science, Military, Times ID, and Discovery en Español channels.Working for esteemed studios and from his home post-production studio, David crafted DVDs for industrial and government clients, wrote and produced a number of live musical performances, and trained non-technical clients in both Final Cut Studio and switching from

a PC to a Mac A member of AFTRA and the Screen Actors Guild, David appeared in the HBO

series The Wire and VEEP along with a smattering of major studio films In 2012, David

designed the curriculum and lead classes for the DC-area MVI Media Academy, teaching anyone from any background everything about moviemaking In May, he began work as a Quality Control Analyst for the new Verizon Digital Media Services group, helping create and maintain a fully-automated mass transform farm for major broadcasters, Hollywood studios, hotel chains, and international news conglomerates

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Importing music from iTunes and GarageBand 14

Importing data from a tape-based camera 19Importing and working with layered Photoshop files 21

Importing Final Cut Pro 7 projects 26Working with your already organized media 31

Getting acquainted with the Final Cut Pro X interface 38

Adding keywords to your clips 42Marking clips as favorites and rejected 45Creating a Smart Collection 49Working with a second computer monitor 52Working with a broadcast safe monitor 55Customizing the Event Library and Event Browser 57

Creating additional storylines 109Trimming audio and video separately with a split edit

(also known as making a J or L cut) 112Grouping clips together as a compound clip 114Adding markers and to do items 118Auditioning multiple shots or takes 120Editing in beat to the music 123Using the Precision Editor 127Multicam part 1 – getting your media synced and prepped 131Multicam part 2 – making the live cut 135Multicam part 3 – fine-tuning your multicam edit 137

Reading and understanding the audio meters 142Lowering your music during speakers 145Lowering a loud, unexpected background sound with manual keyframes 148Replacing bad audio with a cleaner recording 151Sound effects, part 1 – browsing, connecting and panning 154Sound effects, part 2 – animating with keyframes 157Sound effects, part 3 – working in a surround sound space 160Removing unwanted audio channels 165Unlinking audio from video 166Using FCPX's auto audio enhancements 169

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Copying and pasting effects onto multiple clips 194Going green (screen) part 1 – the basics 196Going green (screen) part 2 – improving your key 197Going green (screen) addendum – using the mask effect

to cut out unwanted parts of an image 202

Adding transitions to clips 206Adjusting the transition's parameters in the Viewer,

Creating counters and countdowns 214

Inserting a placeholder clip 220Creating a text style template 223Creating a credit sequence 227Creating a video-in-text effect 231Creating a custom animated title 234Creating and reusing show intro 237

Making freeze frames and speed changes 244

Cropping or trimming a clip 262Panning and zooming over a photo or clip with the Ken Burns effect 267

Making your image move by keyframing in the Viewer 277

Table of Contents

Automatically balancing color and/or match color to another shot 296Manually color balancing with the Color Board 301Picking a color look or creating your own 306Fixing the exposure and adjusting the contrast with help

from the Luma waveform monitor 311Adding secondary color corrections, part 1 – shape masks 317Adding secondary color corrections, part 2 – color masks 321Adding secondary color corrections, part 3 – combining

Keeping only one color in your image 328Spotlighting an object or text 333

Exporting an archive-quality version of your film 340Exporting for Apple devices and computers 343Sharing your video on YouTube and other video sharing sites 347

Roles, part 1 – labeling clips with Roles 354Roles, part 2 – exporting selected Roles 359Sharing large files over the web with Dropbox 363Sharing your project with other applications using XML 367Duplicating or moving projects from one drive to another 373Archiving a project for possible future editing 376

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As technology becomes more and more accessible and easier to use, we are expected to do more in less time than ever before Video editors are now expected to be able to not only edit, but create motion graphics, fix sound issues, enhance image quality and color, and more And many workers in the PR and marketing world are finding the need to know how to get viral videos made from start to finish, as quickly as possible Final Cut Pro X was built as a one-stop shop, with all the tools needed to produce a professional video from beginning to end

Released in June 2011, FCPX's life got off to a bumpy start as many professionals were taken

by surprise by Apple's dramatic shift in the user interface and feature set from Final Cut Pro

7 Some of these claims were merely a knee-jerk reaction and some were genuinely valid At first glance, the interface resembled Final Cut's baby sibling, iMovie, leading to assumptions that Final Cut had been dumbed down While the interface does indeed resemble iMovie, we must keep in mind that iMovie's current interface was designed in 2007 whereas Final Cut's interface was designed in the late 90s So the reality of it is, on the surface, iMovie did have a superior, more modern interface to Final Cut's dated one

As for the feature set, what pro features FCPX lacked when it was first released were quickly added via free software updates over the course of the next year What started off as a bumpy ride has since smoothed out to a solid path and choice for both amateur and professional video editors And with massive and extensive plug-in support found on Internet, FCPX's feature set continues to grow on nearly a daily basis This isn't Final Cut Pro 8 This is a whole new generation of editing

What this book covers

Chapter 1, Importing Your Media, focuses on making FCPX work for you the way you want it

to, with advanced organizational tips as well as how to customize the interface

2

Chapter 4, Enhancing Your Editing, raises the bar a bit by introducing more advanced tools

and techniques to accomplish more specialized tasks, such as editing music, creating a multicam edit, and more

Chapter 5, Sweetening and Fixing Your Sound, teaches you how to read your audio meters

and balance your audio, as well as recording voiceovers while working with surround sound, and more

Chapter 6, Practical Magic: Also Known As Useful Effects, demonstrates some of the most

useful and practical effects found in the Effects Browser, and how to install more and

accomplish a green screen project

Chapter 7, Titles, Transitions, and Generators, explores its namesake by revealing some of the

deeper, hidden features to seemingly simple extras, which you can add to your project

Chapter 8, Get Your Movie to Move, will teach users how to play with timing in FCPX, as well as

how to animate your media on the screen with keyframes

Chapter 9, Altering the Aesthetics of Your Image, introduces core color correction and grading

concepts with FCPX's all-new Color Board, as well as how to isolate color changes using shape and color masks

Chapter 10, Getting Your Project Out of FCPX, offers a plethora of options on what to do with

your project once you've wrapped up the editing process, including burning optical media, uploading to social media sites, and archival tips and tricks

Appendix, Working with Motion and Compressor, introduces you to Motion and Compressor

interfaces, and also shows you how to publish templates to FCPX and get chapter markers to work for you

What you need for this book

Honestly, you don't need much to get started with this cookbook Hopefully, you've got some video files to work with; otherwise, why would you have purchased a video editing program in the first place? If you haven't imported any of your video from your camera yet, don't worry; the book covers that as well! It also wouldn't hurt to have a few photos and songs lying around your computer

If you want to learn the basics of FCPX's companion programs, Motion and Compressor (which was covered in this book's Appendix), you can purchase both from the Mac App Store for $49.99 each

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Who this book is for

This book is for video editing enthusiasts looking to take their skills to the next level, and for Final Cut Pro 7 users who are ready to make the switch to a whole new editing paradigm While the book is by no means highly advanced, it makes certain assumptions of your having

a basic grasp on core video editing concepts and a familiarity with the Mac OS X environment

Conventions

In this book, you will find a number of styles of text that distinguish between different kinds of information Here are some examples of these styles, and an explanation of their meaning.File types in text are shown as follows: " Deep inside you're likely to find files with the extension

.mts, m2ts, or m2t (on some HDV cameras) "

New terms and important words are shown in bold Words that you see on the screen, in menus or dialog boxes for example, appear in the text like this: "clicking on the Next button moves you to the next screen"

Warnings or important notes appear in a box like this

Tips and tricks appear like this

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1 Importing Your Media

In this chapter, we will cover:

f Importing from a tapeless video camera

f Importing MTS, M2TS, and M2T files

f Importing DSLR video

f Importing music from iTunes and GarageBand

f Importing still images

f Importing from a tape-based camera

f Importing and working with layered Photoshop files

f Importing iMovie projects

f Importing Final Cut Pro 7 projects

f Working with your already organized media

f Relinking media files

Introduction

Most artists have it easy—a painter grabs a brush, some paint and goes straight for the canvas A writer grabs a pen and paper (or keyboard) and starts writing A graphic artist grabs a tablet and starts drawing If only it were that easy for video editors!

Well before an editor can start doing any actual work, we've got to spend a good amount of time getting organized and importing our media The act of importing is simply the process

of bringing our media inside FCPX and making the program aware of its existence It's very

Importing Your Media

6

Unlike the digital music world, however, which only has a small handful of file formats, the digital video world has dozens, and the process for importing these different media types can vary greatly And, to top it all off, we have many options to consider as to how we want FCPX

to process and handle that media as it is imported!

FCPX can import many kinds of media, but there are many factors that must be considered before doing so to determine the best workflow for a project, and where there's a will there's a way—even if FCPX can't immediately import certain file types or projects from other programs, this chapter will help explain workarounds to do the impossible!

Importing from a tapeless video camera

Chances are, if you've bought a video camera in the last few years, it doesn't record to tape;

it records to some form of tapeless media In most consumer and prosumer cameras, this

is typically an SD card, but could also be an internal drive, other various solid-state memory cards, or the thankfully short-lived trend of recordable mini DVDs In the professional world, examples include Compact Flash, P2 cards (usually found in Panasonic models), SxS cards (many Sony and JVC models, Arri Alexa), or some other form of internal flash storage

How to do it

1 Plug your camera in to your Mac's USB port, or if you're using a higher-end setup with a capture box, plug the box into likely your FireWire or Thunderbolt box If your camera uses an SD card as its storage medium, you can also simply stick the SD card into your Mac's card reader or external reader If you are plugging the camera directly

in, turn it on, and set it to the device's playback mode If FCPX is running, it should automatically launch the Import from Camera window If it does not, click on the Import from Camera icon in the left of the toolbar You will see thumbnails of all of your camera's clips You can easily scrub through them simply by passing your mouse over each one

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Chapter 1

2 You can import clips one at a time by selecting a range and then clicking on Import Selected… or you can simply highlight them all and click on Import All… To select

a range, simply move your mouse over a clip until you find the point where you want

to start and hit I on your keyboard Then scrub ahead until you reach where you want the clip to end and hit O.

Importing Your Media

8

3 Whether you chose to select one, a few, or all your clips, once you click on the Import button you will arrive at the Import options screen Choose what event you want your clips to live in, choose if you want to transcode the clips, and select any analyses you want FCPX to perform on the clips as it imports them Click on Import FCPX begins the import process You can close the window and begin editing immediately!

How it works

The reason you can edit so quickly, even if you're importing a massive amount of footage, is thanks to some clever programming on Apple's part While it might take a few minutes or even longer to import all the media off of your camera or memory card, FCPX will access the media directly on the original storage device, until it has finished its import process, and then switch over to the newly imported versions

There's more

Creating a camera archive

Creating a camera archive is the simplest and best way to make a backup of your raw footage Tapeless cameras often store their media in really weird-looking ways with complex folder structures In many cases, FCPX needs that exact folder structure in order to easily import the media

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Chapter 1

A camera archive essentially takes a snapshot or image of your camera's currently stored media and saves it to one simple file that you can access in FCPX over and over again This

of course also frees you to delete the contents of the memory card or media drive and reuse

it for another shoot

In the Camera Import window, make sure your camera is selected in the left column and click

on the Create Archive button in the bottom left corner The resulting window will let you name the archive and pick a destination drive Obviously, store your archive on an external drive if it's for backup purposes If you were to keep it on the same drive as your FCPX system and the drive fails, you'd lose your backup as well!

The process creates a proprietary disk image with the original file structure of the memory card FCPX needs the original file structure (not just the video files) in order to properly

capture from the card By default, it stores the archive in a folder called Final Cut Camera Archives on whatever drive you selected

Later when you need to reimport from a camera archive, simply open the Camera Import window again, and if you don't see your needed archive under Camera Archives on the left, click on Open Archive… and find it in the resulting window

To import all or not to import all

If you've got the time, there's nothing to stop you from looking at each and every clip one at a time in the Import from Camera window, selecting a range, and then importing that one clip However, that's going to take you a while as you'll have to deal with the settings window every time you click on the Import button If you've got the storage space (and most of us do today), just import everything and worry about weeding out the trash later

But what about XYZ format?

There are two web pages you should bookmark to keep up to date

One is www.apple.com/finalcutpro/specs/ This web page lists most of the formats FCPX can work with Expect this list to grow with future versions

The second site is help.apple.com/finalcutpro/cameras/en/index.html This web site lets you search camera models for compatibility with FCPX

Just because a format isn't listed on Apple's specs page, doesn't mean it's impossible

to work with Many camera manufacturers release plugins which enhance a program's capabilities One great example is Canon (www.canon.com), who released a plugin for FCPX allowing users to import MXF files from a wide variety of their cameras

Importing Your Media

10

Importing MTS, M2TS, and M2T files

If you've ever browsed the file structure of a memory card pulled from an AVCHD camera, you'll have seen a somewhat complex system of files and folders and almost nothing resembling

a normal video file Deep inside you're likely to find files with the extension mts, m2ts, or

.m2t (on some HDV cameras) By themselves, these files are sitting ducks, unable to be read

by most basic video playback software or imported directly by FCPX But somehow, once you open up the Import from Camera window in FCPX, FCPX is able to translate all that apparent gobbledygook from the memory card into movie files FCPX needs that gobbledygook to import the footage But what if someone has given you a hard drive full of nothing but these standalone files? You'll need to convert or rewrap (explained in the following section) the clips before heading in to FCPX

Getting ready

There are a number of programs out there that can tackle this task, but a highly

recommended one is ClipWrap (http://www.divergentmedia.com/clipwrap) There is

a trial, but you'll probably want to go ahead and buy the full version

Chapter 1

3 Click on the drop-down menu titled Output Format You can choose to convert the files to a number of formats including ProRes 422 (the same format that is created when you select the Create optimized media option in FCPX) A faster, space-saving option, however, is to leave the default setting, Rewrap (don't alter video samples):

4 Click on Convert When the process is done, you will have new video files that end in

.mov and can be directly imported into FCPX via File | Import | Files

There's more

Other alternatives

ClipWrap is far from the only solution out there, but it is definitely one of the best The

appendix of this book covers the basics of Compressor, Apple's compression software which can't convert raw AVCHD files in most cases, but can convert just about any file that QuickTime can play The software company, iSkySoft, (www.iskysoft.com) makes a large number

of video conversion tools for a reasonable price If you're looking for a fully featured video encoding software package, look no further than Telestream Episode (www.telestream.net) or Sorenson Squeeze (www.sorensonmedia.com) These two applications are

Importing Your Media

12

Rewrapping or transcoding

As mentioned in step 3 in the previous section, we could have chosen to transcode to ProRes

422 instead of rewrapping This is a totally fine option, just know the differences: transcoding, takes much longer, it takes up much more file space, but on the plus side, it is Final Cut Pro X's favorite format (because it's native to FCPX, made by Apple for Apple) and you may save time in the actual editing process by working with a faster more efficient codec once inside FCPX If you chose to rewrap, you still have the option to transcode when you import into FCPX.Importing DSLR video

With each passing day, more and more advanced enthusiasts, prosumers, and even some professionals are turning toward digital single-lens reflex (DSLR) still cameras for their video-making needs DSLRs offer a few unique features at a reasonable price range that typically cost thousands more in dedicated video cameras Two of these most prominent features include interchangeable lenses, as well as much greater control over depth-of-field than most low-to-mid-range video cameras offer DSLR video does come with its own set

of drawbacks, however Many models offer vastly inferior on-board microphones, limited non-stop recording time, and little to no stabilization options If you go the DSLR route, FCPX is perfectly suited to work with your camera's media as the majority of DSLRs create ready-to-edit H.264 files And as your DSLR is NOT an actual video camera, we bypass the Import from Camera window entirely!

How to do it

1 Connect your DSLR to your Mac via USB or simply insert the camera's card into a memory card reader

2 Select File | Import | Files…

3 Locate your storage device for your camera's media, likely located in the DEVICES list

in the left side column of the Import Files window

4 Once selected, find the folder with the media This is usually a folder labeled DCIM Select your following import settings to your liking and click on Import:

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Chapter 1

How it works

As you can see, the process is very straightforward, and even easier than importing from a regular video camera! The part that often confuses new FCPX users is why we don't go to the Import from Camera window A DSLR is a camera, right? Well, the Import from Camera window is strictly used for dedicated video cameras A DSLR is a still camera that happens to also be able to record video The individual files it creates (H.264) are immediately ready for import into FCPX and do not require being processed/transcoded

There's more

Transcoding H.264

As always, when you import files into FCPX, you have the option of transcoding If H.264 is readily accepted by FCPX, why transcode to ProRes? Well, while H.264 is a space-efficient video codec, it's not particularly edit-friendly It takes a lot more processing power to modify and render H.264 files as they are heavily compressed If you're creating a very simple or short project with H.264 files that is simply a series of cuts with maybe a few transitions and

a title or two, you're probably fine to save time and skip the transcoding process However, if your project is going to become more involved with lots of extras, including effects and color correction, take the time to transcode upfront You'll save yourself a lot of time in the editing process and your computer will thank you for not stressing it out!

See also

Importing Your Media

How to do it

1 Click on the Show/Hide Sound Browser button on the right of the tool bar The Sound Browser appears split into two sections The first lists what sources we have to select from GarageBand and iTunes should be listed:

2 Click on iTunes Your entire music library appears in the bottom half of the window You can narrow down the list by either clicking on the disclosure triangle to the left of the iTunes label and selecting a playlist, or by typing in the search box at the bottom

of the browser window:

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Chapter 1

3 When you have found the song you want, you can click on the song title and drag it into your open project, dropping it wherever you choose If you drag it to the end of a project, it will add it to the primary storyline If you drag it below any clips along your timeline, it will connect itself to that clip as a connected clip (read more about the

connected clip in the Creating connected clips recipe).

4 Click on GarageBand in the Sound Browser Just like clicking on iTunes, you will see

a list of any GarageBand projects you have been working on The only pre-requisite

is that you have saved an iLife Preview of the file (you are prompted to do this when saving and closing a new GarageBand project for the first time) Just like with

an iTunes track, click-and-drag the music file you want into your project

How it works

When you drag an audio file directly into a project, a duplicate of the file is added to the project's default event (set when you originally created the project) That means, even if you delete the song from iTunes or GarageBand, it will still work fine in your project In

addition, any compressed audio files you import from iTunes automatically get converted into uncompressed WAV files, which FCPX handles more smoothly than typically compressed MP3 and AAC files

Importing Your Media

16

There's more

Import now, use later

If your project hasn't really taken shape yet, but you know you want to import music from the Sound Browser to use later, you don't have to drag a song or sound effects directly into the timeline Instead, simply click-and-drag them from the Sound Browser to the event of your choice in your Event Library They will copy into the event and stay there until you are ready

to use them You can also apply keywords and make them favorites as well!

Tons of sound effects

If you haven't done so already, run your Mac's Software Update A download titled Final Cut Pro X Supplemental Content should appear that will install more than 1,300 high-quality sound effects that can be accessed in the Sound Browser Additionally, it will download

extra presets for the Space Designer plugin, covered in the Creating a surround sound

space recipe

See also

Clicking and dragging is easy, but not always the fastest or most accurate way to add a file to

a project's timeline Read the Creating connected clips, Appending, inserting, and overwriting

clips to a storyline recipes in Chapter 3, Basic Editing Mechanics to learn about the different

types of edits in FCPX and how to use keyboard shortcuts to quickly add clips (both video and audio) to your timeline in different ways

Importing still images

Making a movie isn't always about using moving images There are plenty of instances where you need to use still images, whether for a slideshow, b-roll, documentary, or

some other purpose

How to do it

1 With a project of your choosing open, click on the Show/hide the Photos Browser button in the toolbar, indicated by the camera icon:

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Chapter 1

2 The window, shown in the following screenshot, is broken down into two pieces The top half shows what sources of photos you have to select from and the bottom half displays the photos in the source selection Depending on what photo software you use, you may see iPhoto, Aperture, and/or Photo Booth listed in the source window

To easily dig deeper into the iPhoto or Aperture libraries (which are likely to have hundreds or even thousands of images), click on the disclosure triangle next to each

to display a list of your albums, events, projects, and so on You may also use the search box at the bottom of the window to narrow down your images:

3 Find the image you are seeking, and click-and-drag it into your project's timeline If you drag it to the end of a project, it will add it to the primary storyline If you drag it above any clips along your timeline, it will connect itself to that clip as a connected clip In the following screenshot, the image was added as a connected clip over two other clips:

Importing Your Media

18

How it works

When you drag an image file directly into a project, a duplicate of the file is added to the project's default event (set when you originally created the project) That means, even if you deleted the song from iPhoto, Aperture, or Photo Booth, it will still work fine in your project (assuming you have set FCPX to copy all imported media into Events)

There's more

Import now, use later

If your project hasn't really taken shape yet, but you know you want to import photos from the Photos browser to use later, you don't have to drag a photo or photos directly into the timeline Instead, simply click-and-drag them from the Photos browser to the event of your choosing They will copy into the event in the Events browser and stay there until you are ready to use them You can also apply keywords and make them favorites as well!

Selecting more than one image at once

If you were creating a slideshow, this would seem like a pretty painful process if you had to drag 117 images into your timeline! Luckily, you can easily drag two or more images into the project by one of two methods Once you've selected an event or album in the Photos browser, you can do any of the following:

f Use the command key to select multiple images at once and drag them into

your project

f If you simply want the entire event or album, click-and-drag the icon of the event/album itself into your project (or FCPX Event of your choosing) to add every item at onceEven if you're not going to use every image, sometimes this is a faster workflow so you can just easily delete the few images you don't want in your timeline as you go

Importing images not in Apple photo software

Some Mac users don't use Apple's various photo offerings, which is fine Perhaps your photos are simply residing in a series of folders somewhere on your computer You can import images using the File | Import command and choose an event to place them in You can even drag images directly from their folder in Finder into the FCPX interface and drop them on top of the event of your choice as well!

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See also

So, what can you do with photos once you've got them imported? Try reading some of the

recipes in the Chapter 8, Get Your Movie to Move such as Panning and zooming over a photo

or clip with the Ken Burns effect, Creating a video wall, and Cropping or trimming a clip.

Clicking and dragging is easy, but not always the fastest or more accurate way to add a file to

a project's timeline Read the Creating connected clips, Appending, inserting, and overwriting

clips to a storyline recipes in Chapter 3, Basic Editing Mechanics to learn about the different

types of edits in FCPX and how to use keyboard shortcuts to quickly add clips (both video and audio) to your timeline in different ways

Importing data from a tape-based cameraToday, it's hard to find a video camera in a store that still records to tape The camera world has virtually completed its slow and painful transition from tape-based to tapeless media However, for those of us who are clinging onto our old, yet trusted equipment, or who work in

a professional environment that is forced to use their technology till the day it dies, we still need FCPX to be able to import from these cameras

Luckily, FCPX can still import from most tape-based camera formats, including HDV, DV, DVCAM, DVCPRO, DVCPRO 50, and DVCPRO HD However, support for the process has been severely deprecated It's still an easy task, but there aren't nearly as many bells and whistles

to import from tape as there used to be in FCP7

How to do it

1 Turn on your camera and set it to playback mode (this differs from camera to

camera) Attach it via FireWire to your Mac or capture device

2 If FCPX is open, it should automatically open the Import from Camera window

If not, click on the Import From Camera icon in the left of the toolbar:

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3 Queue your tape to the point you want to import from either by using the camera's

controls, or by using the J, K, and L keys on your keyboard to rewind, pause, or play,

respectively Click on Import:

4 In the next window, pick your settings such as what event you want the video saved

to and if you want any analysis or transcoding done When you're done, click on Import again

5 FCPX begins importing right away It will continue to do so until it either reaches the end of the tape, your disk fills up (don't let this happen!), or you click on Stop Import Remember that tape-based capture happens in real time If you have 57 minutes of footage, it will take 57 minutes to capture!

There's more

If you're lucky…

Depending on your camera, FCPX may be able to detect starts and stops (when you click

on Record and Pause) on your tape automatically If it can, FCPX will split up your imported footage into individual clips!

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If you run into problems, try a camera archive

Reports of tape capture problems in FCPX have been widely reported (such as dropped frames, missing video, and so on) As Apple pushes technology farther and faster, they tend

to leave behind what they believe to be dying technologies (in this case, tape) Users who have run into various issues capturing from tape have also found better success by creating a camera archive of their footage first, then importing from that, rather than doing an immediate

and direct import Read the Creating a camera archive section for more info When all else

fails, try importing your footage into iMovie first, then import that project into FCPX!

Importing and working with layered

Photoshop files

Importing a standard photograph or image file is a very straightforward process, covered in

the Importing a still image recipe But what about when you've created a complex Photoshop

file with multiple layers? Luckily, it's just as easy to import psd files into FCPX as any other media file, but FCPX has to handle such a file a bit differently in order to accommodate the multiple levels of a layered file

Getting ready

Layering in Photoshop has been around for many, many years so you don't need any specific version of the program to create one of these files In this exercise, we created a very simple layered file of a slightly overlapping red, green, and blue circle You can create a similar file as well, or use your own creation When you've created your layered image, simply save the file in the standard psd format Do not export it as a JPEG, TIFF, or any other image format or it will flatten your image!

You don't need to have Photoshop installed on your machine in order for FCPX to import and handle psd files, so if a client sends you a psd via email, you're still able to work with it in FCPX!

How to do it

1 As always, highlight the Event you want to import the file into, and choose File | Import

| Files… Find your psd file or files wherever they may be and choose Import

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2 The files appear in your event In this case, we have imported two identical looking

.psd files of a simple red, blue, and green circle One file contains layers and the other was flattened Note that the flattened psd file appears with a standard image icon while the layered version has an icon indicating that the file has been turned into

a compound clip:

3 Edit the layered file/compound clip into a timeline of your choosing In this case we will place it in an empty timeline It still looks like one clip, but that's the trick to get compound clips—it appears as one, but secretly houses numerous media clips inside:

4 Double-click on the clip Voila! We have loaded the compound clip into its own timeline and now see all the layers as individual clips stacked on top of one another

We can treat each layer as a regular clip and tweak it however we like!

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5 Let's make the red circle larger Click on the red circle clip in the timeline Then click

on the Transform button under the Unified Viewer Resizable corner handles appear

on the red circle

6 Click and hold on one of the blue corner handles and drag away from the circle The circle will get larger:

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7 Maybe we want to delete a layer entirely Click on the green circle clip in the timeline

and hit Delete The green circle disappears Click on the back arrow Timeline History

button to return to your main timeline:

There's more

Background layers

Unless you consciously deleted it or changed settings in Photoshop before saving, chances are your psd file will have a white background When you import it into FCPX, that white background will still be there, but luckily, it's just a layer and can be deleted easily

See also

For more detail on the Transform tool mentioned in this recipe, read the Using the Transform

tool recipe in the Chapter 8, Get Your Movie to Move To learn more about compound clips, read

the recipe Grouping clips together as a compound clip in Chapter 4, Enhance Your Editing.

Importing iMovie projects

We all have to get our feet wet somewhere when it comes to learning how to edit video, and rarely do people start right off the bat in something as grandiose as FCPX Many of us get our hands dirty in a simpler program such as iMovie before making the leap into more professional editing Even if you've got a bunch of projects sitting in iMovie, you can easily import them into FCPX to take advantage of its far wider range of features and capabilities The process is incredibly easy, but there are a few things you should know about when going through the process

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Getting ready

All this requires is an active project in iMovie '11 or later:

How to do it

1 In FCPX, select File | Import | iMovie Project

2 Select your iMovie project file and select Import

3 FCPX will take a few moments to copy over the necessary media, creating both a new event and a new project Double-click on the project and begin editing!

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How it works

The transition from iMovie to FCPX is very smooth Not only are the interfaces very similar, but FCPX has every title, effect, and transition that iMovie possesses (and obviously many more) One of the only caveats is with the Movie Trailers feature of iMovie These will not import into FCPX properly unless you go to File | Convert to Project in iMovie before you try and import the project into FCPX

There's more

Importing just your iMovie events

If you didn't have an active project you wanted to import from iMovie into FCPX, but simply wanted to take all of the media from your iMovie events, you can do this as well In FCPX, just

go to File | Import | iMovie Event Library This will import every event you have in iMovie It's

an all or nothing deal!

Analyzing iMovie footage

Even if you have your preferences set to analyze all imported footage for people, stabilization, and so on, FCPX skips over this when importing iMovie projects If you want to override this, you can have FCPX review your footage after the fact by selecting your clips, right-clicking, and choosing Analyze and Fix…

Importing Final Cut Pro 7 projects

One of the biggest complaints about FCPX when it was released, was that it had zero

capability to import projects that had been created in Final Cut Pro 7 This obviously irked many long time FCP users who had vast amount of archived projects that would never be able to be opened unless they kept FCP7 on their machine Apple chose not to directly rectify this problem, but thanks to the release of version 10.0.3 and its stronger XML capabilities, a company called Intelligent Assistance released 7toX for Final Cut Pro This program acts as a middleman to get your FCP7 project files converted for FCPX

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How to do it

1 We start in Final Cut Pro 7 Make sure your browser window is active and nothing inside is currently selected: